


Mistakes (Don't) Happen

by raiining



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: M/M, Originally Posted on Tumblr
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-07
Updated: 2015-09-07
Packaged: 2018-04-19 13:41:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 851
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4748480
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/raiining/pseuds/raiining
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Phil doesn't <i>make</i> mistakes, that's why agents trust him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mistakes (Don't) Happen

**Author's Note:**

> This fic is self-therapy, because I made a mistake yesterday and someone else paid the price for it. I have to keep telling myself that I _will make_ mistakes. This isn't the first and it won't be the last.
> 
> It's just hard in this line of work. I think Phil would understand.

Phil has his head down on his desk and is seriously considering drinking during working hours when a familiar _rat-a-tat-tat_ echoes through his office.

Phil straightens immediately, pulling his jacket down to hide the creases. “Come in,” he says, wasting a moment he could have used to come up with some excuse instead to pray, _Not Clint. Please, God, let it be anyone but Clint,_ except the door opens and of course it’s Agent Barton who pokes his head inside because, today, the universe hates him.

“Hey, Boss,” Clint says, his careful tone a clear clue that he’s already heard about Phil's fuck-up. “How’s it going?”

Phil doesn’t want to meet his eyes right now, but he knows Clint is called Hawkeye for a reason and if there’s anything Phil can do to salvage the situation, he’s going to do it, so he clears his throat in what he hopes is his usual manner and looks up. “I’m just finishing up some paperwork, Agent Barton,” he says, instead of demanding that he leave right the fuck now. “Is there anything I can help you with?”

“Uh, no. Not really,” Clint says, rubbing at the back of his neck awkwardly. “I was rather wondering if there was something I could do to help _you?_ ”

Phil’s sure that his expression has gone flinty, but he can’t rein it back now. “Oh?”

“Um, yeah,” Clint says. “Maybe?”

“Agent Barton,” Phil starts.

“You’re not a robot,” Clint blurts out.

Phil pauses. “Excuse me?” he asks, thrown.

Clint blushes. “You’re not a robot,” he says again, like it’s a meaningful statement and not some random assortment of words. “I mean, you work harder than ten field agents and a support staff put together, and your ops are beautiful things with elegant backups, but you’re not – I mean–” He swallows. “It’s okay that you make mistakes.”

Phil’s grip tightens around his pen. “No, it’s not.”

“It _is,_ ” Clint insists, coming forward. He sounds determined, and so earnestly sincere, that Phil has to check to make sure he’s real and not a product of his own deranged imagination. The door swings closed behind him before Phil’s completely made up his mind. “You caught the problem, anyway. You radioed in for support.”

“Not soon enough,” Phil spits. Jiang’s terrible, bloody cry still rings in his ears, and Phil doesn’t think he’s going to forget the sound of it anytime soon.

“But that’s okay,” Clint says. He steps a little closer, and then lifts a hand and lets it hover, like he’s not sure where it should go. “Because you’re human, and not a robot.”

“I wish I were,” Phil confesses, as he watches Clint’s hand hang in midair. It’s mesmerizing. Will it come down on his shoulder? Or won’t it? Who can know?

“I don’t,” Clint tells him seriously, and – oh, so the hand is coming down after all. Phil feels its grip and is reminded in that moment that he skipped lunch, and dinner, in the fuck-up that Johannesburg had become.

“If you weren’t human,” Clint goes on, leaning closer, “it would feel really weird to do this.” 

Phil blinks, but then lips – _Clint’s_ lips, of all things – are right there, on his, and they’re softer than Phil had thought they might be, those few, lonely nights he’d imagined this, lying aching in his room.

“Clint,” Phil asks warily, because he’s not entirely sure Clint’s not _not_ a hallucination, at this point. “Does this mean you still trust me?”

Clint blinks, as if he’s confused.

“Because I fucked up,” Phil goes on, hurriedly now, because once the words start coming it’s like they can’t stop – won’t stop, not until Clint knows what he’s getting into. “And I know that I’m the man you look up to, the one who’s always promised to get you home, and I don’t know – I _can’t_ know – if I’ll be able to live up to that.”

Clint smiles and shakes his head. “You never promised to bring me home, Coulson. You only promised me that you’d try. I know – and everyone outside this room knows – that you absolutely tried your best today. Mistakes happen, and ops go bad. That’s not a surprise.” His lips quirk. “The surprise is that you haven’t pushed me away yet.”

His smile is lopsided, but Phil can read the real question behind his eyes. Phil debates what to do next, except there’s never been a universe in which he _won’t_ take anything and everything Clint throws at him, like a starving dog, so he carefully threads his fingers forward, over Clint’s tac suit and through his belt loops, and pulls him closer. “Never,” Phil says. “I’m good if you are.”

“Please,” Clint whispers, against his lips, and so Phil tips forward and kisses him.

It’s messy – wet lips and too many teeth – but it’s perfect, too. Phil blinks and leans back enough to look up at Clint. “I’m sorry I messed up today,” he says seriously. “I’ll try harder tomorrow.”

“If that’s what you need to do,” Clint tells him. “Now shut up and kiss me.”

Phil does.


End file.
